Category Archives: Clinical Negligence

We’re delighted that the new Handbook, 2018-19 edition, will be published at the end of this month.The new edition is fully revised and updated and packed full of useful advice, hints and tips and guidance. It’s the only fully comprehensive guide to the whole legal aid scheme, described by some readers as the ‘bible on legal aid’.

This edition welcomes a new general editor joining Vicky and Simon, Sue James. Sue needs no introduction to legal aid lawyers as a leading housing lawyer and the recipient of a LALY lifetime achievement award.

Anthony Edwards returns to edit the crime sections, and his vast experience and knowledge makes that section indispensable for criminal lawyers.

Returning contributors Steve Hynes and Richard Charlton have updated their chapters on policy and mental health. For this edition we have brand new content of interest to all civil legal aid lawyers from a range of expert practitioners:

Leading costs lawyer and chair of the ACL legal aid group Paul Seddon has revised and greatly extended the civil costs chapter

Simpson Millar solicitor and LALY nominee Silvia Nicolaou Garcia has contributed a brand new chapter on community care

Consultant and IT expert Jane Pritchard has written a detailed guide to using CCMS

Bigger and better than ever and fully up to date including the 2018 contracts, the Handbook is the one book no legal aid lawyer can afford to be without. Pre-order your copy now from the LAG Bookshop

The LAA has amended all current contracts in order to meet the requirements imposed by the General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (EU) 2016/679) and the Law Enforcement Directive (Directive (EU) 2016/680), being implemented under Part 3 of the Data Protection bill. Amendments regarding the GDPR apply from 25 May 2018. Amendments relating to the Directive apply from 6 May 2018.

There are some detailed obligations. The LAA require you to notify them within 5 business days if you receive the following in relation to LAA or shared data:

A data subject request

A request to rectify, block or erase personal data

A complaint or other communication about your (or the LAA’s) handling of data

A communication from the Information Commissioner

You must also indemnify the LAA if it is fined because you fail to comply with the legislation.

This afternoon the LAA issued a new civil keycard, keycard 54, containing revised eligibility limits. The main change appears to be a small reduction in dependant’s allowances.

It is unfortunate that the keycard was not issued until the afternoon of the day it came into force. You may wish to check any grants, particularly of Legal Help and CLR, made today to confirm the client is eligible.

The LAA has sent emails to holders of civil, family and mediation contract holders to inform them about contract extensions to 31 August 2018.

Holders of 2010 contracts (Mediation) and 2013 contracts (Family, Immigration/Asylum, Housing/Debt) need to send back an acceptance form. The letters attached to emails give a deadline of 5 December 2017, the website says 6 December 2017.

Holders of Housing Possession Court Duty Scheme contracts will receive an extension offer in due course.

Holders of welfare benefits, mental health, and community care contracts will have their contracts extended automatically.

Holders of AAP etc., clinical negligence and public law contracts will have their contracts terminated earlier than originally envisaged, so that they will also end on 31 August 2018.

If you haven’t received an email, you should contact the LAA’s central commissioning team: civil.contracts@legalaid.gsi.gov.uk

The long-awaited review of LASPO, promised by the government within three to five years of implementation, has finally been announced.

In a written statement to Parliament yesterday, the Lord Chancellor said it would be conducted by MoJ officials, with input from interested parties, and would report by the 2018 summer recess (which would take it just beyond five years since LASPO came into force in April 2013).

There have been several developments since we reported that the LAA opened the tender for face to face civil and family contracts to start in September 2018.

Tender open for HPCDS

The Agency has gone ahead with a complex price competitve tender for Housing Possession Court Duty Schemes (HPCDS), which seems unlikely to solve the crisis in finding sufficient practitioners to provide the schemes; but only time will tell. More information can be found here.

Most people are finding the process straightforward

However, most of the feedback we are receiving from practitioners bidding for face to face contracts is that the process is more straightforward than they anticipated.

People like the button which checks whether they have responded to all the questions they need to.

They also like being able to download a PDF of their bid. On the relevant ITT page, look out for the three little dots in the top right hand corner. If you click on that and then select ‘printable view’, you will be able to download a PDF of your bid.

FAQs

The LAA has issued some initial frequently asked questions – FAQs. These are worth reading. Amongst other things, they confirm that you will be able to withdraw from part of your bid without jeopardising the rest of it (FAQ 10.1).

Miscellaneous NMS

All successful bidders will get 5 miscellaneous NMS; but you can bid for 25 or more to undertake compensation claims for vicitims of trafficking and modern slavery. ATLEU (legal charity the Anti Trafficking and Legal Exploitation Unit) is encouraging practitioners to apply. They point out that this work is ideally suited to employment lawyers, discriminantion lawyers, personal injury lawyers and civil litigators more generally. With claims for failure to pay the National Minimum Wage (which are often a feature of such cases) being worth upwards of £100,000, perhaps this is worth considering? More details can be found on ATLEU’s website.